Hello Richard, Scattered thoughts here:
What you may be picking up in your listening of those divisions is the profound effect that the Italian violin school (Corelli, Geminiani et al) had on native composers in Scotland. There were also Italian violinists employed in Edinburgh as well as London, which is where Avison did some study with Geminiani. No doubt the Edinburgh influence was also felt further south. The material in Peacock has probably responded to this to some extent. Worth remembering too, that the specified instruments there are also violin and flute. I think many variation sets have an implied bass part contained in the solo part, making a continuo part redundant. Not quite on that 'variations' topic, the Gow publications all had bass parts and the earliest editions indicated Harpsichord (later 'Piano-Forte') and Violoncello. . . . . none of which properly addresses your question! Francis On 25 Nov 2010, at 17:50, Richard York wrote: > I was listening recently to a trio playing 17th/18th Cent. divisions on > La Folia on the radio, and was struck afresh by how similar are some of > the things appearing in the nsp variations. > (And yet different.)[Special aside for "Round the Horn" listeners :) ] > Divisions on viols or recorders were normally played with at least a > bass, and/or a harpsichord or whatever, and our variations/divisions > must come out of the same culture in the first place, whether it's > later a parallel or a parent-child type development to get to where > Peacock's sets arrived. > So, given that pipes are generally thought of as a solo instrument, > (correct me if not!) do we know at what stage of development the > divorce from the continuo or ground bass instrument actually happened? > Assuming it did. > Do the smallpipes with their variations repertoire first appear having > already made the musical separation, or was there any practice of > playing them over a ground? > (Please note, this *is* on topic!) > Best wishes, > Richard. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
